Ritual of the Stones (Ballad of Frindoth) (13 page)

As
it happened, alleviating the inn of a cask of ale proved to be the easy part.
It was an unusually busy night in the inn and Banbury had sent Trement down to
the cellar to replenish the stock. Trement, being a willing but ultimately
stupid boy, left the cellar door open whilst he was wheeling two barrels at a
time to the bar.

Seeing
their opportunity. Jensen and Brody dashed into the cellar and grabbed the
nearest cask whilst the girls stood watch. They then fled into the safety of
the woods.

The
hard part had actually been trying to find four mugs to drink the ale in
without raising any suspicion. In the end, the four of them settled for drinking
directly out of the tap and proceeded to get very drunk.

Jensen
had staggered off into the woods to relieve himself and found Brenna squatting
in the trees before him. This was not unusual, as the four of them were more
than comfortable with each other and often relieved themselves in front of each
other.

Jensen
had been fumbling with his trousers and was surprised to see Brenna standing in
front of him.

“We
did it,” he slurred, smiling.

Brenna
smiled at him and then kissed him on the lips, before whispering in his ear, “You
did it.”

Jensen
had been too dumbfounded for words. The rest of the night, he had been confused
and quiet, which Brody and Janna put down to his drinking.

Over
the next couple of days, he couldn’t get the kiss out of his head. He would lie
awake at night remembering how it felt, the softness of her lips and the
slightly sweet taste. No matter how much he tried to reason with himself that
it was an isolated incident and nothing more could happen due to his friendship
with Brody, Jensen caught himself exchanging shy and furtive glances with
Brenna, smiling discreetly at each other and then acting awkwardly in the
other’s presence.

A
week later the two found themselves alone again. Jensen was minding his
father’s shop whilst he went into Compton to get supplies. Brenna entered the
shop and after a nervous greeting appeared to be examining every candle on the
shelves. Jensen knew full well that she hadn’t been interested in the candles
and asked her why she was there.

“Look,
about the other night, when I kissed you,” she began, “I know it took you by
surprise and I just wanted to apolo—”

She
never got to finish her sentence. Jensen had kissed her. Since that episode the
two had grown closer and closer, stealing away at every opportunity to satisfy
their physical needs.

Jensen
was shocked at how quickly his feelings had deepened for her over the summer.
Despite the excitement of a hastened kiss and grope every now and then, he was
pleasantly surprised how much he wanted to just be with Brenna and to share
with her what he was feeling.

A
lot of the time he was happy to just be around her, without them having any
physical contact. If Brody or Janna noticed anything, they never mentioned it
or let on, although Jensen and Brenna both agreed they wanted no one else to
know.

Tonight,
however, there suddenly seemed a barrier between the two of them that had not
been there before. Jensen knew it was because there was a level of expectation
in the air. Brenna was due to leave on the morrow, and when she returned (even
if he could convince his father not to go ahead with his foolish scheme), there
was a good chance things would not be the same between them. Worse still, if
his father forced him to flee, then this was the last time that he would ever
see her.

He
desperately wanted to tell her about his sister. Janna was her close friend, as
close as he and Brody were. The last couple of days they had explained to
everyone that Janna was too sick to see anyone. With all that was going on,
Jensen was amazed no one connected her sudden illness with people finding the
stones. But as his mother said, people are often too consumed with their own
lives.

Mertyn
had made it clear that no one outside the few people he and Tyra had told was
to know that Brody had been chosen. Jensen did not blame him. The other stone
in the town had been found by a woman called Elsie Brookman. Jensen did not
know too much about Elsie other than she was elderly and lived with her
husband. They were happy in each other’s company, choosing not to have any
children. However, since it had become common knowledge that Elsie had found a
stone under her pillow, people had treated her differently. They either looked
at her through pity-filled eyes or avoided her as if she had a highly contagious
disease. The gossip fixated on the fact that the stone was silver—as if that
had some significance.

Earlier
this morning she had snapped in the marketplace and began hollering at
everyone, demanding they at least try to treat her like she was a normal woman
whilst she was still living. Eventually, her husband gently led her away,
leaving people shaking their heads and muttering amongst themselves.

“We
do not have to do anything tonight, you know, if you don’t want to,” Brenna
said.

“It
is not that I am not keen. Believe me, I want to,” he said.

“Well
I could definitely tell that,” she said, sliding her hand towards his groin and
squeezing playfully. “What is stopping you then?”

Throughout
the summer, Jensen had been surprised at Brenna’s forwardness. She was the one
to initiate things and was generally the one that progressed their physical
relationship. He wondered where she got her experience from. It was a thought
he instantly pushed from his mind. He did not want to know. It was not unusual
for girls her age to have been with a man (some not through choice). He
wondered uncomfortably if Janna was this advanced?

“Hey,
where are you tonight?” she said.

“I’m
sorry, I am just thinking about tomorrow and your brother.”

“Oh,”
she said.

Jensen
chastised himself. He knew he had made her feel bad that she wasn’t thinking
about him as well.

“I
didn’t mean it like that,” he said.

“It’s
all right. You are right, we shouldn’t be thinking about what we want to do.
I’m a bad person. I was hoping tonight we could forget everything that is going
on and just have each other.”

Brenna
sat up. He thought at that moment she seemed like the younger sister of his
friend. For the first time this summer, he felt like the elder person in the
relationship.

“I
just meant the situation being like it is. You going away, it is kind of
forcing us into a tonight or not at all type scenario. I was thinking if Brode
had not been chosen, would we even be thinking of being together tonight?”

Even
in the moonlight he could see the teasing smile on her face.

“If
I had not seen your manhood, I swear I would think you were a girl,” she said
and punched him on the arm.

Jensen
rolled over away from her. He hated it when she teased him. He wished he did
not care about girls’ feelings. He would be better off if he just slept with
them and then laughed about them the next day like every other man.

After
a while, he felt Brenna’s hand rest on his arm and felt a familiar stirring
below. Immediately, his anger began to ebb away. All she had to do was touch
him and he felt better.

“I
forgot to say that I love that about you too. Jensen Oberon, you are more than
enough man for me.”

With
that, he swiftly turned and pushed her back onto the straw, diving on top of
her and pinning her to the floor.

“I
will show you exactly what type of man I am,” he said, grinning mischievously.
Brenna squealed in delight, round about the same time as the nearby screaming
began.

***

Anastas
was in love. Not your young girl, besotted infatuation, but the proper stomach
filled with a thousand butterflies, permanent smile on her face, love. The kind
that completely took over your life, no matter how hard you tried to deny it.

She
could not get Mikel Rhonson out of her head. At work she was driving everyone
crazy, making sloppy mistakes and singing all of the time. When she woke up of
a morning, the day was going to be perfect as Mikel might visit her. When she
went to bed of a night, the night was going to be perfect as she would dream of
Mikel and when she would see him next. Her friends couldn’t stand it. Although
happy for her, they couldn’t tolerate hearing about Mikel Rhonson anymore. They
found the whole thing quite frankly nauseating.

Not
that Anastas didn’t deserve to be happy. At nineteen years of age, she hadn’t
had the easiest life. Born into slavery, she had been a servant for as long as
she could remember. Sometimes milking cows, sometimes serving her master at one
of his dinner functions. On a couple of occasions she was even used as a piece
of meat to satisfy her master’s needs. She didn’t like to think of those times,
though. Those times were soon going to be a distant memory. She was going to be
free, thanks to the wonderful Mikel Rhonson, her true knight. This very morning,
in fact.

She
was sitting on the tiled floor of the kitchen, scrubbing hard. Her hands were
numb as she dipped the sponge in the bucket of cold water to rinse the suds
off. Master Worrell did not permit his servants to use hot water. He felt that
cold water instilled discipline in his servants, let them learn the harsh
realities of life. By depriving them of such luxuries as hot water, they would
not miss what they didn’t have and get ideas above their station.

Even
the cold water could not dampen Anastas’s spirits, though. She looked around
the kitchen, taking in the gleaming pans that hung from the walls, the wooden
worktop where she had prepared hundreds of dinners and the huge golden cauldron
that was Master Worrell’s most prized possession.

She
hated the cauldron, not because she had been forced to slave over it for the
majority of her life, but because she saw it as a pointless luxury. No one
other than the servants ever saw it and when all was said and done, it served
the same functionality as a cauldron you could find in the slums of Wissimi.
Anastas saw it as a waste of gold. She didn’t begrudge anyone their riches but
deplored those that felt the need to let others know their wealth.

She
had only ever seen Master Worrell use it once and that certainly was not for
cooking, but to discipline another servant by forcing them to thrust their hand
into the scalding water. Anastas had been very young and could not even
remember what the servant had done to deserve such punishment; she learnt the
lesson though—never offend or disobey Master Worrell.

Anastas
looked out the kitchen window and her heart soared. On the horizon, Mikel
Rhonson could be seen on his black stallion Dusk. Even from this distance she
could see he was wearing the king’s armour, the silver outfit with its
signature blue and red striped emblem on the shoulder. Beside him, his steward
held his banner whilst leading another horse along. A horse meant for her!
Anastas squealed, unable to contain her delight.

“We’ll
be sorry to lose you, Anastas,” Ghorum the head chef said, appearing in the
door way.

He
wore a huge smile on his podgy face which betrayed his statement. In truth, she
knew he was not sorry at all. He considered Anastas a daughter to him and
couldn’t have been happier that she had been “rescued”, as he put it.

“I
wish I could say I will be sorry to go, Ghorum,” Anastas said. She rushed to
him and threw her arms around him, planting a big sloppy kiss on his cheek as
she did so. “Is this really happening? Can I really be this happy?”

Ghorum
broke the embrace and looked at her, holding her shoulders with both his hands.
He seemed to be measuring her. To him it would seem like she had grown up so
fast.

“It’s
happening and I couldn’t be happier.” He laughed at the sceptical look Anastas gave
him. “Well, okay. I’m losing an excellent apprentice and friend, but I couldn’t
be happier for you.”

“I
will come back for you, Ghorum, I promise,” she said.

Ghorum’s
smile faltered slightly; he knew it was a promise that she couldn’t keep.

“The
only thing that you have to promise me is that you enjoy your life from this
moment forward,” he said.

“I
will. I really will.”

A
small figure appeared behind Ghorum. He was not pleasant to look at. His face
looked like someone a lot bigger than him had squashed it together and it had
stayed like that. Small beady eyes were set above a pug nose. Below that were
two repulsive, thick lips. The bottom one stuck out a lot further than the one
above giving him a look of a trout.

“Master
Worrell,” Anastas said, jumping to attention. “I was just saying good-bye to
Ghorum whilst cleaning the floor. I will finish it, I promise.”

Please don’t let him ruin this for me
, she thought. Surely there was nothing he could say or do that
would prevent Mikel from taking her. He was rich but he could not go against a
knight of the king, especially one as notorious as the “Cadaver Knight”.

“Oh,
don’t worry about the floor, my dear,” he said.

Anastas
bit her bottom lip; she did not like his tone. Master Worrell had never let her
off lightly on one of her duties before and she did not think Sir Mikel’s
imminent arrival would make him start now. It was more like him to make Mikel wait
whilst she finished all of her chores, just so he could show some measure of
power. One glance at Ghorum told her that he was thinking the same.